Lead Designer Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Lead Designer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Lead Designer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £306, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 September 2025.

The table below provides contractor rate benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 368 376 423
Rank change year-on-year +8 +47 +81
Contract jobs requiring a Lead Designer 9 4 6
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.058% 0.023% 0.028%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.064% 0.024% 0.030%
Number of daily rates quoted 9 1 4
10th Percentile £303 - £504
25th Percentile £305 - £509
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £306 £680 £556
Median % change year-on-year -55.00% +22.25% +35.67%
75th Percentile £331 - £630
90th Percentile £352 - £694
UK median daily rate £378 £613 £650
% change year-on-year -38.27% -5.77% +18.18%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the UK excluding London. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK excluding London with a recognized job title 13,994 16,371 20,262
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 89.71% 92.27% 94.19%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,606 9,355 13,519
10th Percentile £213 £220 £225
25th Percentile £361 £375 £388
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -
75th Percentile £575 £594 £600
90th Percentile £663 £676 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £528
% change year-on-year -4.76% -0.57% -4.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,306 1,353 1,206
10th Percentile £13.50 £14.51 £14.19
25th Percentile £16.50 £19.59 £17.75
Median hourly rate £25.15 £43.00 £43.17
Median % change year-on-year -41.51% -0.38% +96.20%
75th Percentile £51.65 £66.61 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £74.70 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £43.00 £44.00
% change year-on-year -41.51% -2.27% +69.23%

Lead Designer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings that featured Lead Designer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Lead Designer in the UK excluding London

Lead Designer
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Lead Designer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Lead Designer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Lead Designer
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Lead Designer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Lead Designer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Lead Designer
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Lead Designer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 26 September 2025. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Wales - 8 £306 - 3
North of England -19 1 £425 - 5
North West - 1 £425 - 3
Lead Designer
UK

Lead Designer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 26 September 2025, Lead Designer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the UK excluding London region featuring Lead Designer in the job title.

1 8 (88.89%) Agile
1 8 (88.89%) User Experience
2 6 (66.67%) Mentoring
2 6 (66.67%) Master's Degree
2 6 (66.67%) Degree
3 5 (55.56%) Interaction Design
3 5 (55.56%) Coaching
4 4 (44.44%) Service Design
4 4 (44.44%) Decision-Making
4 4 (44.44%) DevOps
4 4 (44.44%) Pharmaceutical
4 4 (44.44%) Business Case
5 3 (33.33%) Public Sector
5 3 (33.33%) Welsh Language
5 3 (33.33%) NHS
5 3 (33.33%) Prototyping
6 2 (22.22%) Problem-Solving
6 2 (22.22%) Strategic Thinking
6 2 (22.22%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
6 2 (22.22%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 2 (22.22%) Service Delivery
6 2 (22.22%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 2 (22.22%) Social Skills
7 1 (11.11%) Accessibility
7 1 (11.11%) User Research
7 1 (11.11%) Organisational Skills
7 1 (11.11%) Low-Code
7 1 (11.11%) Change Management
7 1 (11.11%) Strategic Planning
7 1 (11.11%) Data Protection

Lead Designer Skill Set
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Cloud Services
1 1 (11.11%) AWS
1 1 (11.11%) Azure
1 1 (11.11%) Figma
1 1 (11.11%) GCP
General
1 4 (44.44%) Pharmaceutical
2 3 (33.33%) Public Sector
2 3 (33.33%) Welsh Language
3 2 (22.22%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 2 (22.22%) Social Skills
4 1 (11.11%) Organisational Skills
Miscellaneous
1 3 (33.33%) NHS
2 1 (11.11%) Data Protection Act
2 1 (11.11%) Data Structures
2 1 (11.11%) Low-Code
Processes & Methodologies
1 8 (88.89%) Agile
1 8 (88.89%) User Experience
2 6 (66.67%) Mentoring
3 5 (55.56%) Coaching
3 5 (55.56%) Interaction Design
4 4 (44.44%) Business Case
4 4 (44.44%) Decision-Making
4 4 (44.44%) DevOps
4 4 (44.44%) Service Design
5 3 (33.33%) Prototyping
6 2 (22.22%) Problem-Solving
6 2 (22.22%) Service Delivery
6 2 (22.22%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 2 (22.22%) Strategic Thinking
6 2 (22.22%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
7 1 (11.11%) Change Management
7 1 (11.11%) Data Protection
7 1 (11.11%) Design Thinking
7 1 (11.11%) Strategic Planning
7 1 (11.11%) User Research
Qualifications
1 6 (66.67%) Degree
1 6 (66.67%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (11.11%) Accessibility